The present invention relates to microwave methods of measuring and analyzing internal properties and characteristics, such as moisture content, density, material uniformity, and, defects and types thereof, and variabilities thereof, of commercial sized whole rolls or pallets of paper, and more particularly, to a method of bi-directional (longitudinal and angular) three-dimensional microwave scanning of a whole roll or pallet of paper. The method of the present invention enables, and further includes, three-dimensional volumetric mapping of internal properties and characteristics of the whole roll or pallet of paper.
The present invention is particularly relevant and applicable to manufacturers, users, or/and further processors, of commercial sized ‘whole’ rolls or pallets of paper. Herein, a ‘whole’ roll or pallet of paper refers to a roll or pallet of paper as manufactured in its whole or entire final form, for example, having relatively bulky geometrical dimensions (diameter, height, length, width) on the order of about 1 meter. This is in contrast to a single portion or section of paper cut from a partly unrolled whole roll of paper, or, a single square or rectangular sheet or piece of paper separately taken from a whole pallet of stacked paper. Depending upon the thickness of the paper, a whole roll of paper having such geometrical dimensions can be unrolled to a total length of on the order of tens, or even hundreds, of meters. Similarly, a whole pallet of stacked paper having such geometrical dimensions can be unstacked to a total length of on the order of tens, or even hundreds, of meters.
Such relatively large sized whole rolls and pallets of paper are ordinarily manufactured in paper mills from bulk quantities of wood pulp or/and wood chips formed from cut lumber obtained from harvested and processed trees. Commercial sized whole rolls and pallets of paper serve as raw material for manufacturing paper and paper products, which involve subjecting the whole rolls or pallets of paper to a variety of different processes. Such processes typically involve cutting various lengths of unrolled paper from a whole roll of paper, or unstacking separate sheets or pieces of paper taken from a whole pallet of paper, pressing, additional cutting, printing, and packaging, and any number of other processes associated with manufacturing paper and paper products.
Herein, internal properties and characteristics, such as moisture content, density, material uniformity, and, defects and types thereof, and variabilities thereof, of a whole roll or pallet of paper refer to the global, bulk, or macroscopic, internal properties and characteristics, such as moisture content, density, material uniformity, and, defects and types thereof, and variabilities thereof, of a specified volumetric segment or number of volumetric segments of the whole roll or pallet of paper, including bulk or macroscopic volume occupied by air and moisture throughout the whole roll or pallet of paper, making up or forming the whole roll or pallet of paper. These internal properties and characteristics of the whole roll or pallet of paper are to be clearly distinguished from the local, molecular, or microscopic, properties and characteristics, such as molecular density, molecular structure, microscopic defects, and microscopic impurities, and variabilities thereof, of only the paper, excluding bulk or macroscopic volume occupied by air and moisture, making up or forming the whole roll or pallet of paper.
Once manufactured, each whole roll or pallet of paper has internal properties and characteristics, such as moisture content, density, material uniformity, and, defects and types thereof, and variabilities thereof, whose values may be outside of acceptable ranges or/and may undesirably change prior to the whole roll or pallet of paper being sent to, or used in, the next manufacturing process. During or/and following such a manufacturing sequence, it is critically important that these internal properties and characteristics of the whole roll or pallet of paper be determined and monitored, such as by employing quality control and quality assurance procedures. Data and information obtained from the quality control and quality assurance procedures are used for controlling or/and adjusting the internal properties and characteristics of the whole roll or pallet of paper, such as by employing process control and process feedback procedures, prior to the whole roll or pallet of paper being sent to, or used in, the next manufacturing process or storage, in order to assure proper characteristics and performance of the finished paper or finished paper products.
In particular, if one or more of the above indicated internal properties and characteristics of a given portion or section of the whole roll or pallet of paper is outside of established quality control or quality assurance values, use of such a portion or section of the whole roll or pallet of paper is expected to lead to downstream intermediate products, or stored roll or pallet of paper, similarly failing their established quality control values, potentially causing undesirable rejection of material, manufacturing down time, and added cost to an overall sequence of manufacturing paper or paper products. For example, in the case of manufacturing paper or paper products, if one or more of the above indicated internal properties and characteristics of a given portion or section of the whole roll or pallet of paper is outside of established quality control values, at least that portion or section of the whole roll or pallet of paper needs to be made note of for non-use or/and removal prior to the whole roll or pallet of paper continuing into further downstream processing or storage, otherwise, there will either be down time due to one or more paper press breaks, or ‘below quality’ paper or paper products ending up in the consumer marketplace, clearly undesirable to a manufacturer of paper or paper products, as well as undesirable to consumers of the paper or paper products.
Currently, manufacturers, users, or/and further processors, of commercial sized whole rolls and pallets of paper, employ point or localized types of non-invasive measurement and analysis methods, based on measuring and analyzing individual test points located on the external surface of a whole roll or pallet of paper, or located on a single portion or section of paper cut from an unrolled whole roll of paper, or located on a single square or rectangular piece of paper separately taken from a whole pallet of stacked paper. These non-invasive types of methods are capable of only roughly estimating internal properties and characteristics of a whole roll or pallet of paper. Such measurement and analysis methods are incapable or/and inapplicable for determining or generating three-dimensional volumetric maps of internal properties and characteristics, such as moisture content, density, material uniformity, and, defects and types thereof, and variabilities thereof, of a ‘whole’ roll or pallet of paper.
There is thus a need for, and it would be highly advantageous to have a method of bi-directional (longitudinal and angular) three-dimensional microwave scanning of a whole roll or pallet of paper. Additionally, there is need for such an invention which also enables, and further includes, three-dimensional volumetric mapping of internal properties and characteristics of the whole roll or pallet of paper.